


To Cut the Taste

by icannotevenhhh



Category: Marble Hornets, Slender Man Mythos
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Awkwardness, Coffee, Fluff and Angst, I'm Bad At Tagging, Jay is anxious, Jay needs rest okay, M/M, On the Run, Sleep Deprivation, Tim is...Tim, Worry, lots and lots of rest, this is so bad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:27:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23321656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icannotevenhhh/pseuds/icannotevenhhh
Summary: "Hey! I was working on that!""I watched you save it," Tim stated, pressing a cup of coffee into Jay's hands. "Don't worry, I drowned it in cream and sugar. Though I still don't get how you can stand it like that.""Regular coffee's too bitter."Tim drank his (black, of course) coffee with mild disdain, Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. "Yeah, okay. Keep telling yourself that."
Relationships: Jay Merrick/Timothy "Tim" Wright
Comments: 2
Kudos: 64





	To Cut the Taste

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Birthday, Andy!

Jay’s head whipped up as Tim re-entered the motel room, kicking the door shut behind him with a thud. In his left hand were two cups of generic gas-station coffee, stacked on top of each other with Tim’s palm wrapped around where brown plastic lid met white cardboard bottom. On his elbow was a plastic bag, weighed down by packets of salty snack foods and cigarette cartons. He turned to lock the door behind him, and Jay went back to staring blankly at his laptop.

The screen’s glow burned his eyes as he continued to edit the current entry, moving at a snail’s pace of one click per minute. He’d been at this forever, running on less than two hours of sleep and whatever relief the occasional extended blink brought. He felt like a car on two pints of gas—sputtering, chassis groaning in agony, but still going. He hardly registered Tim’s heavy footfalls until they were right in front of his bed and a hand slapped his laptop shut.

Jay’s head snapped up, furious. “Hey! I was working on that!"

Tim was unbothered by Jay’s anger. His expression was the same as always: cold, hooded eyes and a tight-lipped frown, unmoving as though chiseled in a slab of stone. Jay wasn’t sure if he had ever seen Tim smile.

“I watched you save it,” the man stated, pressing a cup of coffee into Jay’s hands. “Here.” Jay inspected the container, watching as steam rose from the hole in its lid. Tim relayed his obviously-prepared response. “Don’t worry, I drowned it in cream and sugar. Though I still don’t get how you can stand it like that.”

Ah. This again. “Regular coffee's too bitter.”

Tim toed off his shoes and sat beside Jay on the motel bed, the mattress dipping under his weight. He drank his (black, of course) coffee with mild disdain, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. “Yeah, okay. Keep telling yourself that.”

Jay ignored Tim’s comment, hesitantly sipping from his own cup. Tim was right—it was sugary sweet, hardly a hint of coffee to be found. Not even in its undertone or aftertaste. But, above all else, it was warm; nearly hot enough to burn his tongue. Jay shuddered as it bloomed through his chest and down his back, chasing away the goosebumps that had been plaguing him since he woke that morning. “...Thanks, Tim,” he murmured, meeting the man’s eye. 

Tim’s gaze darted away, focusing instead on the exposed drywall beside the room’s TV. “No prob.”

Silence stretched between them like old gum, sending an uncomfortable itch across Jay’s skin. He had grown to be like the man he feared most, Alex; dreading silence and recording himself constantly. But no matter how many tapes he burned through or hours he kept awake, the self-surveillance had done little to stave off his fear of quiet. Jay cleared his throat, drinking some more coffee before settling the cup in his lap. “Uh, so...did anything interesting happen while you were out? Like, at the gas station or...”

He knew he was grasping at straws. Tim was brief with him at best; most of their conversations dying out after one or two words. And besides, what a dumb question. If anything interesting did happen, that would be fucking terrifying. Even a _word_ out of the ordinary was a huge red flag. If there was anything to report, Jay would overanalyze it to the point of losing what final dregs of sleep he caught each night.

“If by interesting you mean I saw Alex pole-vault over that _Thing_ wearing daisy dukes and pink roller skates...no. I didn’t.” Tim popped the top off his coffee and swirled the liquid around, avoiding Jay’s eye for a moment before snorting. “...But there _was_ a guy with pink camo sweatpants, neon green crocs, and a Barney shirt.”

Jay couldn’t help but snort. Tim? Making a joke? _That_ was new. Jay, pleasantly surprised, noticed the little amused smirk Tim was giving him. It looked alien amidst his dark bags and scruffy chin. Jay took another sip of his coffee and thought of another question, desperate for any positive contact between them, anything to keep that smile from falling. This was the longest conversation they’d had in weeks, and he wasn’t ready to let it die just yet. “Was he getting anything weird, or did he just look weird?”

“Does four Monsters and a can of Spam count as weird?”

“I mean, I guess. Do gas stations even sell Spam?”

Tim’s smile widened. “This one did. You wanna know the best part?”

“What?”

“He had a pickup truck with a little confederate flag. It was hilarious.”

Jay laughed, and the taste of coffee on his tongue suddenly didn’t feel so disgusting. Tim watched him, his carefree (well, sort of) expression faltering. 

“Listen, Jay…” he said thoughtfully, setting his coffee lid on the bedside table. “Getting you coffee is no big deal, but you can’t subsist on it forever. You need sleep, not caffeine.”

“I can’t sleep,” Jay protested, his brows knitting together. Nice moment? Gone. He was sad to see it go, though he knew it wouldn’t have lasted long anyway. With Tim, things were serious. Curt. What little humor they shared was dished out in the form of sarcasm and snark, leaving Jay craving moments of sincerity. 

“Too paranoid?”

“That and nightmares. But before you ask, I usually don’t remember them.”

Tim sighed, rising to his feet. “Take it from me, Jay. You still need to try and sleep.”

Sleep.

How could Jay sleep? How could he with murderers on his trail, their crosshairs on the back of his head? How could he with some otherworldly _Thing_ stealing his memories? With his blood refusing to clot? How could he sleep, plagued with wake-up-screaming nightmares? With the inability to have faith in his eyes as he opened them to a new day, not knowing whether it was tomorrow or months ahead until he checked the date on his phone? Sleep was out of the question, Tim himself knew that. They were identical in that respect, the bags under one’s eyes mirrored in the other. And yet Tim held his resolve, grabbing Jay’s laptop and setting it on the floor.

“Come on,” he said, snatching Jay’s mostly-empty cup—Jay had been drinking it like nectar as his head swam—and placing it by the jilted lid on the bedside table. Then, in a moment of uncharacteristic tenderness, Tim pushed Jay back onto the bed.

“Just lay down. I’ll keep watch. It’s alright if you can’t sleep, just take fifteen minutes to...I don’t know, rest your eyes. It’s a damn fact you haven’t taken a single break since I left to get food, and I can’t have you passing out on me.”

“...But I-”

“Jay.”

Tim’s eyes turned hard, and Jay’s argument died in his throat. He huffed, grabbing a pillow and pressing it into his face. Satisfied, Tim’s footsteps moved towards the door, muffled by worn carpet. He took the chair from the room’s rickety desk, its legs scraping as he dragged it behind. It creaked in anguish as he settled, his gentle sigh sparking something in Jay’s chest. 

Jay closed his eyes. It was strange knowing that someone had his back. He had grown so used to amnesia, monsters and masked stalkers that the concept of trust had abandoned him.

And then there was Tim.

Reliable and foolhardy, Tim was his greatest support in the hell he now called daily life. Despite his sarcasm and pessimism, no matter what happened, Tim kept going. He was the very face of a modern Spartan, laconic and steadfast to contrast Jay’s skittishness; obsequious only to his bodily addictions. And, in Jay’s world, where the future was bleak and the now was impossibly bleaker, Tim was an inspiration.

“Hey, Tim?”

Jay’s voice was softened by the down of his pillow, echoing back to him like he was alone. Tim’s response was the best thing he had heard in the past year.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

Tim was silent for a while before his chair shifted. Jay heard his coffee cup sail into the trash can, hitting the bottom with a skitter. “Just get some sleep, Jay. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

And, for once, in his world of disappearing acts and missing time, Jay was sure that he would.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry this is so short! Thanks to my friend James for beta-reading this for me!


End file.
